Sacrament of penance and reconciliation
by RedHatMeg
Summary: Matt is on his way to confession, when Foggy decides to go with him and meet father Lantom. While waiting in church, Foggy has time to contemplate few things.


**First there was idea for "Three Things Foggy Learned About Catholicism From Matt", but then I've realized that I'm concentrating too much on one of the instances, so I decided to focus fully on this one idea of Foggy learning things about the sacrament of confession.**

 **Now, Foggy is an agnostic and I've tried to write him as best as I could, but I know only two agnostics, and I hardly talk with them about their spirituality. I still hope I've written Foggy nice.**

 **Sacrament of penance and reconciliation**

Foggy identified himself as an agnostic. He was never particularly religious, even though some of his family members were devout Protestants. He also never thought about himself as an atheist. He just… Well, he was just hardly thinking about this kind of stuff. That's not to say that he never thought about them at all.

Matt, on the other hand, was this devout Catholic, always very open about his faith. During their Columbia University years, he was always going to church on Sunday and sometimes Foggy could see him praying in their dorm room. One night he even explained to him what's the deal with Devil's Advocate.

It was a part of Matt's upbringing, a part of his personality, and Foggy was cool with it, just like Matt was cool with his friend's agnosticism. They had other things in common, so the fact that they had different views on spirituality wasn't bothering them. If faith was giving Matt comfort and moral compass (because Foggy couldn't deny that Matt was a person of very high morals… even though, he was also sleeping around), then that's fine.

Foggy always thought about Matt's Catholicism as something deeply personal, and he treated it as such. Matt would always go to church early and come back an hour later to be again his calm, optimistic, confident self. What he was doing in church wasn't of Foggy's concern. And to be fair, Matt never asked him to come with him, so he probably also thought the same (or just assumed that Foggy wasn't interested in religion).

Later, when they had their own law firm and Foggy learned about Matt's night activities, Nelson was thinking about the fact that someone so devoted to law could go out and beat the crap out of bad guys. The most shocking thing of this all was that Matt admitted he wanted to kill Fisk at some point. While sitting at Josie's and getting wasted, Foggy was contemplating the last conversation with his best friend and the more he was doing it, the more his anger was fading away and there was only confusion and sense of betrayal. But once or twice Foggy's mind decided to turn his attention on Matt's feelings.

He said he never crossed the line – that he never killed anybody. Maybe he never took a life because he thought that there will be no salvation for him; that it would condemn his soul and he will never be forgiven by God. In this perspective him wanting to kill Fisk became even more scary and disturbing. Who knows what would happen to Matt, if he ever succeeded? Who knows if he could ever live with himself, if he killed someone? Foggy hoped that Matt was at least a bit conflicted about what he was doing, even though, he didn't show any of this during their little talk.

There had to be so much on Matt's conscience…

Time was passing and Foggy decided to forgive his friend and help him bring Fisk to justice. Somehow, someway, Foggy was able to accept Matt's vigilantism… to some extent, at least. He still thought that Matt was reckless and had some unresolved anger issues, but at the same time he trusted that Matt will never cross the line, nor let himself hurt an innocent person. It was the will to save the innocents that motivated him to fight crime in the first place, so Foggy hoped in his heart that Daredevil will never forget about it.

One Friday Foggy went to Matt's flat. It became his daily routine – checking on his friend every morning. Obviously, he couldn't do it during the night, when Matt was running around the Hell's Kitchen, kicking bad guy's asses. So generally in the morning Foggy was calling either Matt or Claire and asking about Matt's health. Sometimes Daredevil had a rough night with couple of broken bones, sometimes there were just scratches, cuts and bruises.

This Friday Matt seemed to be fine, but he told Foggy through the phone that he had something to do before coming to the office.

"And what is that?" Foggy asked. "Because if you want to continue something you started last night…"

"No, no." Matt said, laughing. "I just have to go to church."

"To the church? It's Friday."

"I want to go to the confession. And I want to do it before going to work."

Normally Foggy would just say: "Okay, see you later.", but this time an odd thought crossed his mind.

Well, Matt told him once that aside from Foggy, Claire and Stick, the only person who knew about his secret identity, was his priest, father Lantom. Moreover – father Lantom seemed to be person who was giving Matt advices against killing and going too far in his vigilantism. He also was the first person Murdock would go to with his moral perplexities.

"Can I come with you?" Foggy asked suddenly. "I will wait for you and we will go to work together. Besides," He smiled. "I would like to finally meet this famous father Lantom."

"Are you sure, you want to come with me? I mean, the confession will probably take some time. In the end you will be bored of your ass."

"I'm sure, Murdock. Let's go confess some sins!" He added with enthusiasm.

"I thought, you're agnostic." Matt replied.

"I only wanted to cheer you up. Gosh, dude, stop being so neat-picky."

"Okay, meet me at my block."

And so couple of minutes later Foggy was standing at Matt's door. He didn't have to wait for long, because his friend came out a moment later, suited up, with his glasses on and cane in hand. He closed the door and turned to Foggy.

"You know, it's kind of weird." He said with awkward smile. "I've never suspected that you will ever want to go to church with me."

"Well, you've never asked me to come with you. Besides, maybe you set a good example and I decided to convert into Catholicism."

"Or you could also set your eyes on some hot Catholic girl. That would be more of your style." Matt smiled.

"Are we going to this church or what?" Foggy cut in, a bit annoyed.

And so Matt started to walk and Foggy followed him. Soon they stopped at the big, fenced church. In front of it there was a bench, currently occupied by an old, half-bald priest. Seeing Matt, he quickly stood up and smiled… but when he saw Foggy, he raised his eyebrows.

Foggy didn't have to ask, he already had an idea, who was standing in front of him. And before Matt could even say anything, his business partner skipped to the priest with his hand extended to shake.

"Hello, I'm Foggy Nelson, Matt's best friend. Father Lantom, I presume."

Father Lantom raised his eyebrows again and shyly shook Foggy's hand, before smiling to him friendly and saying:

"Oh, famous Foggy. Nice to meet you."

"Pleasure is all mine." The lawyer said.

"Foggy wanted to meet you, father." Matt explained. "So he decided to come with me to church."

"Oh, I see." Father Lantom turned to Foggy. "We have a coffee machine. Would you like some, mister Nelson?"

"Gladly, but this little boy," Foggy tapped Matt's back. "would like to confess his sins. And we will have to go to work in two hours. So maybe we could do it like this: first Matt goes to confession, then maybe we will have some time for nice conversation before work."

"Certainly." Father Lantom said and directed towards the church. "Come with me." He stopped and looked at Foggy. "Or maybe you would like to wait here, mister Nelson?"

"No, I will go with you." Foggy assured him.

So he followed the priest and Matt into the church. The stained glass in windows, confessionals, pipe organs and wooden benches were the parts he fully expected to see in Catholic temple. The light was easily sipping through the enormous windows above the altar, and Foggy could easily spot baptismal font.

The moment when they entered the building, he saw Matt doing sign of cross, while looking at the literal cross with sculpture of crucified Christ. Father Lantom did it too, so Foggy assumed it's some kind of ritual. For a moment he was contemplating whenever he should also perform this gesture or not, but then he felt he should do it after all. For the sake of respect. After all, he would probably wore skullcap in synagogue, if he would ever go to one.

Father Lantom and Matt directed towards one of the confessionals, while Foggy took a seat on the nearest bench. For a moment he was observing as his best friend enters one tiny room of the confessional, while the priest take the other. And then they closed the doors, and Foggy could not see them anymore. He heard Matt's quiet voice:

"Bless me, father, for I have sinned…"

But then it became even more quiet and Foggy couldn't hear him, nor father Lantom, only their indistinct whispers. To be fair, he didn't want to hear them. It seemed kind of awkward, listening to something that supposed to be only between Matt and his priest.

To be honest, this whole "confess your sins and God will forgive you" concept seemed kind of iffy to him. Someone could be a total asshole to everybody and even do some atrocities, then go to confession and then right back to sinning, because hey – if they confess their sins to priest, they don't have to worry about consequences in afterlife.

And Matt for sure won't stop beating up criminals when he will come out of this confessional, freshly released of his previous sins. Foggy was actually wondering what was exactly happening there. Was father Lantom scolding him after hearing all the things Matt did this time? No, according to Matt, he wasn't that kind of priest. So maybe he was just lecturing him: "That's bad. Don't do it again."? No, he wasn't this kind of priest either. From what Matt told Foggy about father Lantom, he was rather telling Matt about the nature of good and evil, and they were debating about it right now. So probably this confession will take some time.

Foggy looked around. The church was actually really nice. Large enough to feel monumental, and small enough to feel homey. It was also very quiet at this time of the day. The silence was very soothing and Foggy felt that he could gather his thoughts here. He got why Matt liked coming here so much. The only thing disturbing this silence were Matt and father Lantom's fuzzy whispers.

Nelson's eyes turned on the sculpture of Jesus on the cross. It didn't look bad, although, it wasn't also very realistic either. Just a normal sculpture, depicting agonizing Christ.

Maybe when Matt comes here and look at Him… maybe he asks God for advice. As long as Foggy remembered, Matt was this guy, who wanted to do what is right and help people. Foggy liked it about him. It was one of his most admirable characteristics. That was Matt's reason behind going to the law school and behind becoming the vigilante.

So maybe when Matt was looking at crucified Jesus – God in human form, teaching about love, and compassion, and forgiveness; a God, who performed the highest sacrifice for the sake of humanity – he felt uneasy about his choices. Maybe he felt that God is disappointed in him… Or maybe he felt that what he was doing, pleases God.

Foggy was scared that his friend will turn into self-righteous extremist and lose his compassion completely; that he will cross the line and become a monster. He was scared of this every day and every night. He sometimes wished to know what was going through Matt's head – whenever, he was closer to this mindset or not.

Foggy Nelson was agnostic. He wasn't certain if there is any deity on this world. He didn't refuse the possibility of it, but he also wasn't entirely convinced. But if there was a God – an omnipotent, merciful and just God; the One that Matt Murdock believed in – please, let this God deliver Matt from becoming a monster. Foggy Nelson said this prayer only in his head, while still looking at the Christ in front of him.

Suddenly Matt and father Lantom left the confessional. Foggy stood up, as they approached him. Father Lantom directed his guests to the presbytery, where all three of them sat at the table, waiting for coffee to be done.

"Can I ask you something? It's about this confession thingy." Foggy said suddenly.

"Well, mister Nelson…" The priest began, but Foggy cut in:

"Please, call me Foggy."

"Well, Foggy," Father Lantom continued. "if you want to ask about things Matthew confessed to me, I can't tell you."

"No, of course, I wasn't going to ask about _that_." Foggy said and quickly moved to the point: "I was just thinking… I mean, no disrespect to you and your religion, but…"

"But you think that confession can lead to the notion that you can sin all you want and still be forgiven. You're not the only one, son, who thought it."

"Do you know the story about prodigal son?" Matt added.

"The one about a son who took his inheritance, wasted it and then returned to his father?" Foggy asked. "Yes, I know."

"You must understand that sacrament of penance and reconciliation is like this." Matt explained. "The sinner, who is aware of their sins and who wants to reconcile with God, is the prodigal son returning to his father. The father, who greets his son with open arms, is God."

"Besides, the confession isn't just telling the priest about your sins." Father Lantom said. "It requires preparations."

"Preparations?" Foggy raised his eyebrows.

"It's called examination of conscience." Matt clarified. "You have to remember what kind of sins you've committed since the last confession and if you purposely miss one of them during confession, you won't get absolution. On the other hand, if you just forget confess the sin, you have to bring it up next time."

"You also have to feel remorse for what you did." Father Lentom went on.

"And there is also the question of satisfaction." Matt added. "You have to try to make up for your sins to people you've sinned against. Sometimes it's simple, sometimes not."

"So to receive the absolution for your sins, you have to regret it, you have to confess it and you have to make up for it." The priest summed it up.

"You see, it's not just telling what you did wrong and later say few Hail Mary's. It's a complex process."

Foggy looked at Matt. For sure he didn't regret what he was doing and didn't plan to make up for it to people he was beating up. He made it clear when he told Foggy about the pedophile father.

"The espresso is ready." Father Lantom cut his train of thought and stood up. "I'll be back in the minute."

And he went to the kitchen. Matt on the other hand turned to Foggy and whispered:

"You want to say something."

"Well, yes. But I don't want to say it _here_."

"Don't worry. I know, what you want to say."

Father Lantom returned with espresso and put it in front of Foggy.

"It's also important to hear what priest tells the confessor." Matt came back to the previous subject. "The priest in the confessional is God's proxy, so God talks to the confessor through him. He helps understand some things about the committed sin and show ways to fight with it. The talk with priest can give you a wider perspective."

"So when you go t the confession," Foggy began. "you not only get the penance but also a pep talk?"

"You can say it like that." Matt smiled.

"And the penance may vary." Father Lantom cut in. "Some priests stop on the prayers or readings of certain parts in the Bible, while others try to be unconventional and tell you to, for example, live one day like it was the last day of your life."

"Oh," Foggy leaned closer. "interesting."

"Well, I could talk all day about Catholicism," Father Lentom began. "but I would like to know something about you, Foggy."

Foggy got a bit nervous. What Matt's priest wanted to ask him about?

"Is it true that you know Punjabi?"

Foggy beamed with happiness.

"Do I know Punjabi? I'm the Master of Punjabi!"

"You haven't spoke it in years!" Matt said, laughing. "You don't even know how to say your name in that language!"

"Well, maybe I only act like I don't know!"

They were drinking coffee and talking about random things, until Karen called to them, asking where are they. Foggy actually liked father Lantom, and he had a feeling that father Lantom liked him too. They had something in common – they both knew Matt, they both knew he's a vigilante, and they both were afraid that he might become a monster. And they both were ready to prevent it, with or without Catholicism.


End file.
